<p>Teenagers Dream Colleges</p>
<p>Stanford University
Harvard University
New York University
Princeton University
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Yale University
UCLA
University of Pennsylvania
University of Southern California
University of California, Berkeley.</p>
<p>Read more: What’s</a> Wrong With America’s Dream Colleges - CBS MoneyWatch.com</p>
<p>This excerpt from the article is right on target:</p>
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<p>Which is why the tiresome arguments about prestige are indeed so tiresome - because it’s reflecting familiarity, and not prestige based on knowledge. </p>
<p>Read more: [What’s</a> Wrong With America’s Dream Colleges - CBS MoneyWatch.com](<a href=“MoneyWatch: Financial news, world finance and market news, your money, product recalls updated daily - CBS News”>MoneyWatch: Financial news, world finance and market news, your money, product recalls updated daily - CBS News)</p>
<p>It’s still a pretty dumb article though. The colleges she gives as example alternatives are unlikely to be of any interest to ones who have this particular list in the radar.</p>
<p>The other thing is – the question posed as “dream college” doesn’t really mean that that’s really what the person dreams about. I might say that my dream college is Harvard but in actuality I’m plenty fine going to Flagship State U because it’s close to home, it’s cheaper and all my friends go there and the football games are fun. It doesn’t mean I <em>really</em> want to work as hard as Harvard requires, or that I <em>really</em> want to move to Boston. It doesn’t <em>really</em> mean that I’m drooling all over Harvard and am envious of the people who go there, or that I really give Harvard any serious consideration in my day-to-day life.</p>
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<p>Agreed, but I’m not convinced that “saying Harvard is my dream school” really equates to “Harvard was ever on my radar as a serious choice / consideration.” Maybe because I live in Big Ten land, but really, people don’t drool over these schools – except in certain pockets – and their attitude towards them is “Oh, that’s nice. OK, moving on …” I think her other point had to do with the fact that these were cited as dream colleges mostly because they are well-known, not because there was any factual basis for calling these dream schools (“they have the best program in xxxx”).</p>
<p>And there are students who chose these schools for the right reasons. As a parent of a child attending one of these schools, I can honestly say that my child did research the school thoroughly before applying and her decision was largely based on her interest in a specific academic/career goals which this particular school offered.</p>
<p>I dream school isn’t even in America xD but I would say Stanford is my American dream school(:</p>
<p>Where are these colleges “dream colleges”? I agree with Pizza, not really in my neck of the woods with perhaps UCLA ('cause it’s in California) or MIT ('cause everyone’s heard of it)… University of Pennsylvania (only if you love Joe Paterno…LOL)…after that not so much. Where did this “dream college” concept even come from?</p>
<p>Agreed that the “dream school” thing is very regional. Down here in TX, the overwhelming majority of vals and sals go to UT-Austin or Texas A&M. Most don’t even apply out of state. They just published all the vals and sals in the DFW area in the newspaper and there were only a handful - maybe 10 out of 200 total that were headed to any of the schools on that “dream” list. My kids (who are in the top 20 of their graduating class) can’t even name the Ivy league schools.</p>
<p>There’s something wrong with people who dream about colleges.</p>
<p>My son is dreaming about college this summer as he is ripe to go, heh, heh. But I know what you mean, Mini.</p>
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<p>I hope that comment was meant to be as funny as it is :-)</p>
<p>There is definitely a regional element at work here.</p>
<p>If you asked the question here in Maryland, Georgetown would be way up on the list.</p>
<p>There’s always a regional element at work here. Always, always, always. Even for the tippy-tops.</p>
<p>I dream about college sometimes. It’s usually something I ate.</p>
<p>I could use a Dream College. Serious, I need to learn to dream better. Lately my dreams are either incredibly boring cliches (you know, the dream where you forgot to show up for the exam? stuff like that), or they make no sense. Not only that, I can’t even remember them half the time. </p>
<p>Now if I could attend dream college, I think my dreams would improve, and I could have much more entertaining nights. Maybe I could even learn to have lucid dreams. Now that would be cool.</p>
<p>Or, you could take the Dream class offered as a core subject at Stanford. Stanford is quite proud of it and features it during parents weekend!</p>
<p>Not a parent, but:
Isn’t it strange that NYU is listed and is rationalized by the author as because of its ideal location in NY, but not Columbia?</p>
<p>Sent from my Droid using CC App</p>
<p>Not really there are multiple "Columbia"s across the country. If you google Columbia University you’ll see all the web pages are keyword-ed to be Columbia University in the City of New York. “Dream colleges” somewhat presumes everyone would “know” that college.</p>
<p>Combining the point about regionism and NYU/Columbia…where we live everyone has heard of NYU, few have heard of Columbia (or if they have, they don’t know where it is). Seriously. </p>
<p>But she didn’t make up the list, she was just taking a stab at an explanation. Always cracks me up when young people feel so defensive about questioning the ORDER OF THINGS. For most adults, going for a number on USNWR or a school because its considered one on a list called “Ivy League” are silly rationalizations.</p>